The captain
apologized for not joining us, inasmuch as he had drunk no wine for the
last seventeen years. He appears to be a particularly good and
trustworthy man, and is the only shipmaster whom I have met with, who
says that a crew can best be governed by kindness. In the inner closet
there was a cage containing two land-birds, who had come aboard him,
tired almost to death, three or four hundred miles from shore; and he had
fed them and been tender of them, from a sense of what was due to
hospitality. He means to give them to J-----.
November 28th.--I have grown wofully aristocratic in my tastes, I fear,
since coming to England; at all events, I am conscious of a certain
disgust at going to dine in a house with a small entrance-hall and a
narrow staircase, parlor with chintz curtains, and all other arrangements
on a similar scale. This is pitiable. However, I really do not think I
should mind these things, were it not for the bustle, the affectation,
the intensity, of the mistress of the house. It is certain that a woman
in England is either decidedly a lady or decidedly not a lady. There
seems to be no respectable medium. Bill of fare: broiled soles, half of
a roast pig, a haricot of mutton, stewed oysters, a tart, pears, figs,
with sherry and port wine, both good, and the port particularly so. I
ate some pig, and could hardly resist the lady's importunities to eat
more; though to my fancy it tasted of swill,--had a flavor of the pigsty.
Pages:
374
375
376
377
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398